Sebelius

September 23, 2011 | By Shari Roan, Los Angeles Times / For the Booster Shots blog

Newborns should be screened for critical congenital heart disease, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said Thursday in a letter to the Advisory Committee on Heritable Disorders in Newborns and Children. The recommendation brings the number of newborn disorders targeted for screening to 31. Sebelius had already indicated support for widespread use of the painless, noninvasive test, which measures oxygen in the blood. Low oxygen levels signal the need for further testing to look for a heart-related problem.

WASHINGTON -- Outgoing Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said Sunday that the health insurance exchanges that are now up and running across the country have given uninsured Americans a true choice of insurance plans with price comparisons. “People have competitive choices and real information for the first time ever in this insurance market,” Sebelius said in an interview on NBC's "Meet The Press. " Before, she said, “individuals were really on their own” if they did not have insurance through an employer or the government.

A renewed push for healthcare overhaul is being driven partly by the need to stem escalating insurance costs that are stripping families and small businesses of their health coverage, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said Thursday. "A lot of these customers have no choice," she said, noting that President Obama is expected to unveil his latest healthcare proposal in advance of his healthcare summit next week with members of Congress. "I think the president has indicated that he intends to have a proposal . . . for public consumption before the summit," Sebelius said at a Washington news conference.

By Christi Parsons and Michael A. Memoli WASHINGTON - President Obama named White House budget director Sylvia Mathews Burwell to take over the Department of Health and Human Services on Friday, saying there was "no manager as experienced and as competent" to oversee the next phase of his signature healthcare law. "Sylvia was a rock, a steady hand on the wheel" as the administration dealt with the government shutdown last year, Obama told a...

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius told Congress today that delays in the release of H1N1 flu shots show that the United States is too dependent on other countries for the manufacture of vaccines and that the technology to make them must be improved. Four of the five manufacturers of H1N1 vaccines are foreign companies -- a fact that alarmed lawmakers, who expressed concern about the ability of the federal government to secure enough vaccine to prevent the spread of the swine flu virus.

A renewed push for healthcare overhaul is being driven partly by the need to stem escalating insurance costs that are stripping families and small businesses of their health coverage, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said Thursday. "A lot of these customers have no choice," she said, noting that President Obama is expected to unveil his latest healthcare proposal in advance of his healthcare summit next week with members of Congress. "I think the president has indicated that he intends to have a proposal . . . for public consumption before the summit," Sebelius said at a Washington news conference.

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius on Sunday threw cold water on Gov. Jerry Brown's plan to ask California's poor to contribute to their federally subsidized healthcare — payments the governor has proposed to save the state more than $500 million a year. Brown met with Sebelius for 45 minutes in Washington, where he renewed his pitch for more flexibility in how the state handles Medi-Cal, its health-insurance program for the poor. The governor wants co-pays from recipients for emergency-room visits as well as routine trips to the doctor and dentist, beginning in October.

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius told the nation's leading health insurers Thursday to justify publicly a spate of double-digit premium hikes that have infuriated consumers in at least half a dozen states. Meeting at the White House with the chief executives of WellPoint Inc., Aetna, Cigna and UnitedHealth Group as well as several state insurance commissioners, Sebelius asked the companies to post online their justification for proposed rate hikes primarily affecting customers who directly purchase their own coverage.

At least for one day, the students at Fremont Elementary School in Long Beach could be heard chanting, "Salad! Salad! Salad!" before lunch Tuesday. Maybe it helped that they had an audience, including their principal, the Long Beach mayor, a congresswoman, a county supervisor and U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius. And maybe it helps that teachers and food services staff, parents and a volunteer chef had all worked to put the salad bar in place and will help keep it going.

Dr. Anne Peters knew something was wrong when a fellow physician called to find out why she had been ordering so many MRIs for her patients. The Los Angeles internist said she tried to alert authorities that someone was illegally using her physician identification and Medicare billing numbers to submit phony claims. For months, Peters said, she couldn't get anyone to listen. Because thieves had recruited or created phantom patients, the doctor had no way of resolving the problem.

WASHINGTON - Kathleen Sebelius, who helped guide the rocky and controversial rollout of President Obama's landmark healthcare law, is stepping down as Health and Human Services secretary after about five years, according to a senior administration official. In her place, the president plans to nominate Sylvia Mathews Burwell, director of the White House Office of Management and Budget. Sebelius was not pressured to resign, according to the administration official. But she leaves after presiding over the disastrous launch of the health law's new online insurance marketplaces last fall.

April 10, 2014 | By Daniel Rothberg, This post has been corrected, as indicated below.

WASHINGTON -- Enrollment in healthcare exchanges created under Obamacare has risen to 7.5 million and is expected to continue increasing, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius told a Senate committee Thursday. Sebelius' announcement marks a 400,000-person uptick since Obama announced last week that 7.1 million Americans had signed up for coverage through marketplaces on the final day of open enrollment. The administration's original tally didn't include Americans who, because of issues signing up, received an extension until April 15. "During these past six months, millions have obtained the security and peace-of-mind of affordable health coverage," Sebelius said during a Senate Finance Committee hearing about her department's budget for 2015.

WASHINGTON - Ten Republican senators have called on President Obama to fire Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, who is overseeing the implementation of the Affordable Care Act and its troubled website. Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) and nine other senators told Obama they were concerned not only with the botched rollout of healthcare.gov, but the implementation of the broader law, which they all oppose. Dozens of House Republicans have also pushed for Sebelius' dismissal.

WASHINGTON - In her first appearance before Congress since the botched debut of the federal healthcare website, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius on Wednesday apologized for the "debacle," accepted responsibility and promised the technical problems could be fixed. Sebelius acknowledged that enrolling in insurance plans through the federal government's online marketplace was a “miserably frustrating experience for way too many Americans” - an observation Republicans repeatedly underscored by pointing to a screen that showed in real time that the website, healthcare.gov, was displaying an error message.

WASHINGTON - Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius on Wednesday apologized that the new healthcare website has been a “miserably frustrating experience for way too many Americans” and told a congressional panel she was accountable for the failings while promising they were “fixable.” “Problems are being solved. But we know that we don't have a fully functioning system that consumers need and deserve,” she said. “We're still at the beginning of a six-month open enrollment which extends through the end of March.

WASHINGTON - The Obama administration has not released the number of Americans who have enrolled in new health insurance plans online because there is not “any reliable data,” Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius told members of Congress on Wednesday. At issue is a glitch in the application process that is meant to send information consumers submit online to insurance companies during the enrollment process. Insurance companies have been receiving inadequate or confusing information, which Sebelius said is one of the “priority fixes” being made.

April 10, 2014 | By Daniel Rothberg, This post has been corrected, as indicated below.

WASHINGTON -- Enrollment in healthcare exchanges created under Obamacare has risen to 7.5 million and is expected to continue increasing, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius told a Senate committee Thursday. Sebelius' announcement marks a 400,000-person uptick since Obama announced last week that 7.1 million Americans had signed up for coverage through marketplaces on the final day of open enrollment. The administration's original tally didn't include Americans who, because of issues signing up, received an extension until April 15. "During these past six months, millions have obtained the security and peace-of-mind of affordable health coverage," Sebelius said during a Senate Finance Committee hearing about her department's budget for 2015.

Re "A wait control approach," May 18 Talk about unrealistic. The study suggesting that allowing 16 hours between dinner and the next meal will help you lose weight is ridiculous. Assuming you finish dinner as early as 6 p.m. (unlikely, especially if you prepare it after work), waiting 16 hours until the next meal means 10 a.m., too late for breakfast before work or school. And skipping breakfast is associated with weight gain, according to many other studies. Avoiding snacks after dinner is good advice, but otherwise the article is yet another reminder that we are not rats.

WASHINGTON -- Top Republicans have threatened Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius with a subpoena if she does not provide them documents related to problems with the federal healthcare exchange's website by Monday. In a letter sent Thursday to Sebelius, whose agency has been criticized for the botched launch of healthcare.gov, Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) and Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) asked for specific information related to the opening of the exchange on Oct. 1, including a detailed description of all technical problems with the website and how much the government has already spent to address the problems.